Travel Trends :: Summer Vacation Ideas :: The Add-On

[trip style = multiple]

Vacation add-on: Extending a work or family/friend trip for extra travel benefit.

A trend that comes and goes with the state of the economy and rising fuel prices: the vacation add-on---both part of our regular Travel Trend Thursday feature, as well as the third installment of our three-part Summer Vacation Ideas series {see parts one and two below}.

Pay Less Do More Savvy travelers use vacation add-ons to maximize their travel at every opportunity, especially when the destination is appealing. Similar to booking trips with airline mileage or hotel points, extending a work or personal trip is a great way to pay less and do more. Whether your work is already paying for your flights and hotel anyway, or you're paying for a family event or destination wedding, doing a little more while there---or using it as a jumping off point to explore nearby areas---is worth it.

Add-Ons About one-fifth of the trips my husband and I take are add-ons---a way to travel with less budgetary impact. This year we've added time to work trips in LA in November, Scottsdale in February and NYC in May. I have friends and family who are also very good at vacation add-ons too, and have used work trips or family trips to add time in places they want to see, as well as discover destinations off their radar. Trips to Santa Barbara become trips to Vegas, trips to Denver become trips to Colorado's mountain resorts, trips to Boston become trips to New York, trips to Cape Town become safaris and trips to Victoria become trips across Vancouver Island.

How To Maximize the Add-On Trip

• Plan ahead
• Decide: is it best to tack a few days before or after the work or family-related trip? If so, what best suits your work schedule?
• Do you want wifi? If so, find a hotel that offers it.
• Consider this: if you're taking a ferry or car and staying in a hotel, then most of the journey is already paid for---both for you and your companion---aside from the extra nights.
• Can you use hotel loyalty points or travel credit card kickbacks to extend your stay versus making an out-of-pocket payment?
• Is there a nearby retreat or city you've been dying to explore?
• Are the flights cheap to bring a companion with you, or are you able to use points to fly them free?

Good Trip Styles For Vacation Add-Ons

• trip style = active & adventure - plan a few days of hiking or biking.
• trip style = beach - spend a weekend at a nearby beach town.
• trip style = cruise - near a cruise port? Book a 3-night cruise.
• trip style = safari - near the wild? Book a nature tour or safari.
• trip style = sightseeing - take some extra time to explore the area's important sights.
• trip style = ski - pre- or post-trip ski? Sounds good to me.
• trip style = spa - relax for a few days at the spahhhhhhh.
• trip style = urban - pound the pavement in the your destination or a nearby city.*
• trip style = wine tasting - if you're lucky enough to be near a wine region, well, that's an obvious add-on :)

*Don't rule out nearby cities for your vacation add-on. For example, if you're in LA, take the train to SF; if you're in Ottawa, take the train to Montreal; if you're in Honolulu fly to Kauai etc...

Don't Miss Summer Vacation Ideas :: Luxury Summer Vacation Ideas :: Budget

PS – Aside from our regularly scheduled content, don’t miss next month’s feature: Off The Beaten Path Escapes!

[photos by OKC + @tripstyler]

Travel Trends :: Bed Bug Proofing Your Hotel Room

[trip style = any]

One unfortunate travel trend that never seems to go away is bed bugs. They are everywhere, from campsite yurts to hostels, and 3-stars to ritzy retreats. Bed bugs are travelers too, spreading on birds, bats, humans and suitcases to name a few culprits. They also travel well given their ability to live for 6-12 months without food.

The Nature of the Beast Though bed bugs are everywhere, and their infestation levels go in ebbs and flows, being in Australia's Whitsundays {think multiple backpackers on party boats with bunks} and NYC recently reminded me it was still a big problem, and will forever be a problem. It's the nature of the beast. Like Lauren mentioned yesterday in her Travel Beauty feature, I too saw big groups of protesters outside hotels. These people weren't kidding around, they even had a Macy's Day parade-sized bed bug prop. As the scene was intended, it made my mind wander and my body itchy just thinking about it.

About two years ago I got serious about the prevention and detection of bed bugs, going through a routine every time I check into a hotel room, stay in a yurt, etc... Here are some precautions I use based on the wisdom of others who have experienced the bugs and written about them before me:

Bed Bug Proofing Your Hotel Room

• Before you even book, check to see if the hotel you're thinking about reserving has been listed in the Bed Bug Registry {a user-generated site noting bed bug detection areas in Canada and the US}.
• When you enter your hotel room, lock the door and place your luggage on a stand in or near the bathroom---not near the bed, furniture or curtains.
• Even if you're tired, don't throw your belongings---even an innocent little scarf---on the bed or a chair.
• Immediately conduct a 2-minute investigation of the room to look for reddish brown bugs the size of a small apple seed and droppings the size and appearance of pepper flakes. Note that bed bugs like to hang in groups.
• Check: on and behind the bed's headboard {I always start with this, and get eye level with it in order to see critters more accurately}, foundation, box spring and dark crevices as well as the furniture.
• If you think you spot bed bugs, smell the area. They are known to have a musky sweet scent like almonds.

Dealing With Bed Bugs

• If you think you see bed bugs, speak the hotel immediately, and DO NOT accept a room near the potential infestation site.
• Get the BedbugLogic Protection & Treatment Spray like Lauren talked about yesterday in her Travel Beauty post to remove any bugs you think may have got near your gear or clothing.
• Once you get home, if you still suspect bed bugs, vacuum and steam clean your suitcase {not in your house} and wash clothes and dry on the dryer's hottest setting to kill all stages of bugs.

Finally, I will leave you with this: when you travel with a carry-on, there is less chance for it to come in contact with other bags {and bugs!!!} if it is always with you.

[photo by Medill DC]

Travel Trends :: Fold It!

[trip style = any]

I'm as good as sold on any travel product that scrunches, shrinks or folds. With overhead bin space shrinking and carry-on weight requirements on a permanent diet, packing light, compact and folding pieces for travel is not just a trend-du-moment, but a necessity.

During my recent trip to NYC, I went shopping {quelle surprise!} and came across five compact items I purchased for my future travels. Though none are hot off the runway, some are surprisingly stylish. Now if someone would only invent a pair of folding Jimmy Choos! Tamara Mellon, are you listening?

Folding Water Bottle When I saw this anti water bottle it was love at first sight. It shrinks, folds and doesn't have the extra weight of traditional plastic, metal or glass bottles. Does it get any better? I took it for a test drive this weekend while walking around Seattle. It's small enough to pop in your purse and doesn't weigh you down.

Folding Matte Rain Coat I hate packing a raincoat---maybe it's the bulkiness or the assertion it might rain. I've seen a few travel raincoats in my day, and most are ugly, but I recently found this one from the Japanese retailer Muji. Folding to the size of a small t-shirt, this coat is functional and cute. PS - it's under $15!

Folding Shoes I wish I'd thought of this idea. Foldable shoes? Hello! How many girls long for flats after a night in heels? Moi et toi. I featured this type of shoe in January, but I wanted to feature them again because I found a brand that looks like an actual shoe that you'd wear day-to-day. They are called CitySlips and came in handy this weekend when I wore highish heels to a concert and slipped these babies on for the walk home!

Pill-Sized Towels I have to admit, I bought these super shrunken towels inside a pill container because they were cute. Cuteness aside, they're handy for those times you need to wipe your face or hands with something more girthy than a flimsy disinfectant cloth. With a few drops of water, they expand into a 9 x 11" multipurpose towel and are biodegradable.

Credit Card Cutlery How many times have you stopped for to-go food on a road trip and gotten plastic cutlery with your order? If I counted all the plastic cutlery I threw out or recycled in the past year, it would stack up like a grocery store display. In the spirit of reduce, reuse and recycle, I love this simple credit card cutlery. Perfect for keeping with you at all times, and easy to wash after use. The planet thanks you.

Trip Styler Tip: If you're in a city with a Museum of Modern Art {MoMA}, make time to visit the store. Each MoMA store I've visited is the type of place in which you could get lost and dazzled by design-savvy finds.

Travel Trends :: Mini Guidebooks

[trip style = multiple]

We've all read the Lonely Planets, Rick Steeves, Frommers and Moon travel guidebooks of the world. Heck, we might even have a wack of old editions, circa 1997, collecting dust on a bookshelf. Not surprisingly, guidebooks are going compact, like Smart Cars. Following the trend of minifying everything from airline meals to gadgets, guidebooks have shrunk too. Maybe the classic 1989 Disney movie, Honey, I Shrunk the Kids, was ahead of its time?

Paperbacks There's still a time and a place for larger format paperback guidebooks, after all, with every new year comes an updated edition. Almost every time I've traipsed onto foreign soil, I've read a guidebook before departing. Why? Because I want to be educated on the destination's customs, history, neighbourhoods, hotels, must-sees and restaurants, to hit the ground running and avoid being a tacky tourist. I just wish some of these guidebooks had pull-out sections that I could bring abroad rather than the whole book!

Mini Guides People seem to want smaller, low-profile guides they can bring with them on holidays that can slipped in and out of their cross-body bag or backpack without drawing too much attention. Something light and functional, versus big and bulky. Something concise and concrete, versus longwinded and wordy. With this in mind, here are two mini travel guides leading the charge:

LUXE City Guides: LUXE isn't for everyone. Its penmanship is sassy and its suggestions are saucy. All in all, it's a fun gen-X and Y-targeted guidebook about the size of 3 credit cards stacked on top of each other, telling the who's who, where to go. I've used LUXE's guides for Sydney and NYC, and have been impressed with the fantastic and frank stay, eat and do suggestions. > Books from $9.99 usd, and 12-book box sets from $110 usd. > There's an app for that: free for 'lite' version, $5.99 for full version.

Louis Vuitton City Guides: Even if Louis' monogrammed brand of luxury isn't your thing, don't dismiss the guides, even if it's just for their well known illustrations alone. With 30 European guides, the Fashion House has also come out with editions for NYC, LA, Miami, Tokyo, Kyoto and Mumbai. > 9-Book, 30-city box set from $150 usd.

And don't forget, if you're really set on traveling light, there's always an app for that with most guidebook publishers joining the app craze.

More Travel Trends Ultimate Urban Adventures Curated Luxury Hotel Lists Choose Your Own Adventure Your Extended Backyard

Travel Trends :: Ultimate Urban Adventures & Sydney BridgeClimb

[trip style = urban + adventure]

While in Sydney earlier this month one of the literal highlights of my time in Australia's biggest city was climbing the famed Harbour Bridge {more on this below}. Talking at length with my guide about its inception, the mandatory safety suit and if climbers ever get petrified part way up, I learned that Sydney's BridgeClimb, the first adventure of its kind, has influenced cities like Brisbane and San Francisco {pending} to follow suit.

If your next trip style = urban and you want to spice up the usual <eat, shop, walk, eat, visit cultural attraction, eat> itinerary, why not try:

• Sydney's BridgeClimb - Wind your way through the Harbour Bridge's massive steel archways, scale your way to the top, take in the best views of Sydney's iconic harbour, salute the Aussie Flag and descend.
• Auckland's SkyJump - Jump 192 meters at 82km/h off of Auckland's Sky Tower. Watching this video literally made me almost cry with an equal dose of excitement and fear, and I haven't even done the jump yet!
• Toronto's CN Tower EdgeWalk - Walk 'the plank' of this landmark's narrow ledge, 365 meters above the ground. Opening soon.

The BridgeClimb Go Go Gadget.... When I got to the BridgeClimb's industrial-mod HQ, I knew I was going to be required to wear a grey adult 'onesie' that would make fashion lovers run for the hills. I soon learned function over fashion was for good reason: the suit was custom developed to both match the colour of the working mega-structure, as well as handle significant safety precautions with its doodads and attachments. Case in point, the hat I was provided had a plastic hook which latched onto the back of the suit, and my sunglasses were given a special string to secure them around my neck, and again, to my suit. Essentially, anything you bring onto the bridge has to be attached to the suit, as if you were Inspector Gadget. Everything had to reel back into your person.

Underwear and Fanny Packs My husband Nathan even got to wear a fanny pack, which I learned was a taboo phrase Down Under because it refers to something, well, down under... The Bridge allowed him to bring a camera {only because we did a private "media" climb for Trip Styler}, but there were two conditions: it HAD to be attached to his suit with a retractable string and housed in, as the Australians would say, a bum bag. And speaking of that area, even on the sunny, late-fall day when we did the climb, temperatures were getting into the mid 20's, so I followed the advice of my savvy suit concierge and climbed with shoes, the lightweight grey suit provided and only my undergarments below. Needless to say it was a perfectly breezy climb.

Top Design After an exhilarating ascent, winding our way along lengthy catwalks, narrow passageways, keycard-access security doors and stairs with perforated steel steps---the kind where you can see boats speeding past you below---we reached the top. The space was roomier than I expected. There was even a path cutting through the Bridge's centre, opening up into a diamond-like shape at the arch's mid-point. This gathering place, approximately 134 meters above the sea level, made me want to sit back, relax and toast the world with a bottle of bubbly. But alas, there were no loungers and champagne is not kosher when thousands of cars are crossing below, unless of course the BridgeClimb could figure out a way to attach a plastic bottle and flute to the suit, but I think that could be asking a tad too much.

Urban Adventure After the climb, I changed back into my 'civilian' clothes, threw my suit, belt and accoutrements into futuristic-like funnels for washing, and took in the moment, realizing I had the great privilege of joining the likes of Matt Damon, Cameron Diaz, Will Ferrell, Prince Harry and 2.6 million others who've beat the bridge to complete one of the world's ultimate urban adventures!

Photos {Starting the climb.}

{The stairs and yellow safety tubing directly above.}

{The inside structure.}

{A group climbing the bridge, up, up and away...}

{The safety line is attached to you and the bridge at all times. Aside from when you start and finish, you never have to hook and/or unhook the line---it's continuous.}

{View of Opera House and Bridge's upper walkway.}

{BridgeClimb onesies and the summit.}

{Australian flag at the top.}

{Looking straight down from the top.}

{What we saw as we were descending the stairs.}

{A group on their way down.}

{BridgeClimb's HQ.}

{Some perspective at the end.}

What to know

• Prices start at $188 for adult climbers in off-peak season...
• Kids 10+ can can climb.
• There are 3 types of climbs:
  • The Express Climb - 2 hours 15 mins. The quickie.
  • The Discovery Climb - 3 hours 30 mins. The inner workings.
  • The Bridge Climb - 3 hours 30 mins. The outer arch.
• Each person must perform a breathalyzer test prior to climbing, so don't get too crazy the night before...

PS - the closest comparison to BridgeClimb Sydney in Vancouver is Capilano Suspension Bridge's Cliffwalk, opening soon.

[images taken by @nate_fri + 1 by our trusty BridgeClimb guide]